Once Upon A Time
by CallHerVictor
Summary: 2013 entry for the VAMB Picture Prose Contest. Post-endgame, can Janeway and Chakotay find each other again?


Written for the VAMB Picture Prose Contest. This was my photo #3 entry. Thanks to quantumsilver, Gates, and Audabee for hosting the contest, and Malezita for the image.

* * *

~Once Upon a Time~

* * *

There's a legend among his people.

Many, actually. He's told me a few over the years, most of time in an eleventh-hour attempt to drive home some salient point I was missing, most of them unheard the minute they passed his lips. In truth, they are the same parables I heard as a child, in one version or another, full of lessons and sentiment better placed in fiction.

It's the one he _hasn't_ told me that stuck.

It's a cautionary tale of a man named Snow-Owl, who is captured by a night-witch and cursed to circle the mountain. The witch's daughter, Red Bird, helps him escape. But as evening approaches and the night-witch's power rises, Red Bird lights a ring of fire to protect them. Encircled by flames, they stand watch for the witch. Snow-Owl turns to Red Bird.

_I am in love with you_, he says.

_You are a warrior, and you know many things, _Red Bird says_. But I am a woman, and I know circumstance has brought us together. When the fire dies and the daylight comes you will no longer love me._

I scan the crowd, flitting from face to face, some familiar, some strangers by mere degrees. The flood of Admirals and Starfleet well-to-dos have fallen away leaving a majority of crew with their respective family members. The initial flood of tears has been replaced with melodious laughter and the warm crush of voices that echo under the rotunda. My eyes settle on Chakotay.

He not the same man I came to find. The hard edge has faded from his voice, replaced with a reverent whisper. His eyes bear the mark of this journey, skin seasoned with lines that weren't there the first time we were face to face. Then again, neither was the uniform he so proudly wears.

In retrospect, trusting Chakotay was easy. But_ loving_ him was the hard part. Knowing the inevitability therein – this end. Seven smiles politely in my direction, a blush of color in her pale cheeks, still so uncertain despite the undeniable assets of her age. Chakotay pats her hand where it rests in the crux of his arm. Bitterly I wonder if she knows how he begged me to 'get rid of her' so many years ago, but shove myself away from the thought, away from the wall when that fails, and make my way toward the balcony.

There's sickness in this behavior, scrubbing salt into a wound long-since healed to see if it feels. Remind myself he was here, once… upon a time.

Once, upon a time, he loved me. And everyone in the room behind me knew it. Held it in their eyes like an open secret, telling me in subtle ways they understood, if not approved. Sacrificed shift rotations, holodeck time, and replicator rations in hopes of nudging us ever closer, only to find us falling farther and farther apart.

The one and only Starfleet Captain I saw before today told me it was 'easy' to cling to principles.

_Easy_.

Far fucking from it.

I'd volunteer for another seven years in the Delta Quadrant if it meant I don't have to look at what else was sacrificed for my principles. To not see patina of seven years in my reflection, the creases in the back of my hands, or feel the dull ache of a body that's seen more brutality than tenderness in longer than I feel comfortable trying to recall.

The hushed conversation picks at my ears, but I can no longer find his voice among them, and _I know_ he's standing behind me.

"What are you doing over here all by yourself?"

"Listening."

"Shepherding is more like it." He holds out his hand and I set mine in his. "Where are your mother and sister?"

"I'll see them tomorrow."

He wants to ask why, changes his mind when he realizes he already knows the answer, and tugs playfully at my arm. "You can at least come sit with your senior staff and their families."

"I will, in a bit." His fingers get a quick squeeze, one he reads as dismissal.

It probably is.

He nods once, a wistful smile tucked in the corner of his mouth, then disappears back to the table. I turn back to the gardens, lean against the rail, and let my shoulders sag for the first time in seven years.

* * *

Among the hundreds of messages waiting for me the next morning, is a short, audio-only comm from Boothby.

"_You might be a famous Captain now, but you can still pick up your own damn flowers. I'll be in the gymnasium at noon_."

A pleasant chuckle rises in my throat, and I'm startled at how suddenly things feel so right. Home has meant many different things over the years: freedom from hostile alien attacks, food shortages, and dwindling crew morale. I'd never considered that return to Earth also meant a return to the normalcy I hadn't even realized I've missed.

The chronometer reads a quarter-til and I deactivate the console, tossing a half-hearted explanation at the lock-armed cadet posted outside my office quarters, and head for the quad.

The air is full of cool fog rolling in off the open bay, and the chill shocks me straight and hurries me across the grounds. I rest a minute at the side entrance to the gymnasium, taking in big, healthy gulps of the damp air. My knees still tremble on uncertain ground, body adjusting to planet-side gravity. Though the Doctor promises it will pass in short order, it unnerves me to feel so unsteady.

"Again!" _Slap!_ "Good! Good! Now, keep your elbow high." _Slap-slap!_ "Again! I want to feel that jab!"

The smell of sweat and leather blend together with a voice most familiar, and Boothby's churlish commands send the boxer through another series of strikes against the heavy bag. Though I can't see him, the sounds of his fists striking the target suggest he isn't a novice. I let the door fall shut behind me, drawing Boothby's attention. He gives me a swift nod and turns back to his student.

"All right. That's enough for today. Hit the showers and then we'll get that shoulder iced."

He makes his way across the room, his diminutive body moving with the same alacrity he always has. "Well, well. The fearless Captain Janeway." He dips in for a quick hug which I return effusively. When he draws back, he keeps his hands locked on my upper arms. "You cut off all your hair."

Boothby certainly isn't the first person to make such an assessment since I've returned. My sister made her displeasure clear in alternating busts of wild, screeching laughter and body-wracking sobs, while my mother had taken a much more subtle route, commenting only that eventually it would grow back.

"I needed something more manageable."

"Looks prettier when it's long," Boothby tells me.

"I tend to agree," Chakotay says from his sudden position behind me. Though his voice is playful, it's also sincere, and rounds out the list of people who have ever been allowed to make suggestion regarding my hair.

I wonder briefly if this was Boothby's plan all along, bringing us together in the same way our crew used to, then decide he can't possibly know enough to do such a thing.

I turn and offer Chakotay the warmest smile I have on deck, but feel it crack when I see him fully. Instead of the neutral athletic wear he'd worn on _Voyager_, he is bare neck to navel, and a trail of dark hair disappears into a thin pair of black pants that hang on his sculpted hips.

He ducks his head, grinning knowingly as he unwinds the tape from his fist. "_Captain_."

Whether he does it to snap me back from the wandering gaze I've held a beat too long for it to seem natural no matter _how_ I greet him, or to maintain the proprietary distance that comes with being Seven's _husb_—

That thought comes too quickly to call back any reaction, and what my face must show is some unblended contortion of panic and anger, sadness and fear. It's gone before Boothby notices, but seven years afforded Chakotay a unique awareness I've never been able to break him of, no matter how hard I've tried.

"Kathryn?"

It's a question now, one that hangs between us thicker than the fog on the quad. Boothby senses the shift and eases himself away wordlessly, drawing behind him the last door to my escape.

"I didn't expect to see you here."

"That much is evident," he says and steps into me, bringing with him the sweet smell of soap and sweat. "You can_ still_ talk to me."

"I know." I fan my hands between us, take a full step back, already plotting my retreat. "I'm fine. Just… tired."

Maybe it's because we're home or because he had no belief I'll actually put him on report, but he catches my elbow with one hand while the other brushes the hair back from my face with a feather-light touch. He holds my eyes for one painful second then presses his mouth to my ear.

"I know you better than that." He punctuates it with a soft kiss to my temple, just enough contact to leaden his words.

Frantic, I twist back my arm but feel the gentle pressure increase, hard enough to hold and not be painful. "Oh, no you don't."

"Commander, let me go."

It comes out sharper than I intended but is met with a soft chuckle all the same. "Captain's voice isn't going to work either. Kathryn, look at me."

I realize my refusal to do so is not only cowardly, but points in the exact direction I don't want to go. I force my eyes to his, pulling my mind back to still places. See my breath like light, my fear diminishing on the horiz—

"No Vulcan mind-tricks either."

I'm surprised how easy it is to give in to that request, letting the tension crash over the barriers I've built to keep it at bay. I sag against him, into him, feeling the warm pressure of his touch, his body, pressed against my uniform. He sweeps a free arm around my waist and shifts his grasp to pull me against his sweat-slicked chest.

Numb or maybe feeling for the first time, I press my forehead against his bare shoulder. I begin to tell him the story of Snow-Owl. He listens patiently, a thumb running hypnotic circles against my shoulder as he lets me tell him the legend of his people in slow, heart-sick words. When I'm finished, he draws back far enough to see my face.

"It's an interesting story, but I don't think I've ever told you that one before." His lips press together for a long moment. "Probably because I don't find it particularly relevant."

"_Don't you_?" Even I'm surprised how desperate it sounds, as if I'm pleading for something I don't fully understand.

He chuckles, shakes his head. "No, and I don't think you do either. But then…" He pauses, breath held for a full measures rest. "_That_ would mean you'd have to admit you feel something for me," he says, his voice a bare whisper. "So, do you? Do you love me?"

We hold there, the sounds of our breath counting out interminable seconds before the answer that, either way, will change everything. His eyes settle daringly on my mouth.

"If you don't answer me soon, Kathryn, I'm going to kiss you."

It's a threat that infuriates and thrills me at the same time. If he does kiss me, there is no doubt in the truth will unravel, thereby unmaking all reasons I've held silent for so long. And if I say no…

"Three…"

"Chakotay, please –"

"Two…"

"I –"

"One…"


End file.
